


Holding hands while the walls come tumbling down

by Claire10



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Max-centric, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Steve and Max sibling relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-04 10:56:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20469875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claire10/pseuds/Claire10
Summary: Max Mayfield didn't expect much out of her move to Hawkins- Her top concerns were about surviving her stepbrother, ignoring her stepfather and getting the high score on the Dig Dug machine at the arcade. The last thing she expects to find are friends, a surrogate older brother and a whole dimension of monsters ready to end the world as she knows it.Basically Max's inner thoughts and point of view the night they closed the gate with bonus Max and Steve surrogate sibling action





	Holding hands while the walls come tumbling down

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!! This is my first fanfic so I would really appreciate any feedback, positive or constructive! Thank you for reading! Enjoy!
> 
> Title is from Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Tears for Fears

Max Mayfield is about to scream. 

She’s felt the scream building in her lungs since the demodog tried to get into the bus at the junkyard, flower-petal head opening up above her, fangs dripping, snarling. She had started to scream, mouth opening wide to let out of all her terror, when she was pushed roughly away from the ladder; her hair flew into her eyes as she stumbled but she didn’t need to see to know who it was. There was only one person who could have moved that fast and with that much surety. Steve. He stands upright in the glow of the moon from the open window and wields his spiked bat in front of them, offering his body up as a sacrifice for them. For her. 

Now, she doesn’t know Steve Harrington. The first time she met him had been that very afternoon in the junkyard when he showed up with Dustin and at first, he had barely said two words to her. She thought to herself, Great, another person I just met who hates me already, but she was forced to let go of that impression by the time the bus was fortified and they were sequestered inside. Lucas and Dustin had gone up the ladder in the middle of the bus, taking up tires to form a defensive lookout and she had been clearing the aisle between the seats to make room for them to sit, when Steve approached her. He had set down his nail bat, its dull clunk echoing in the bus and taken some old splintered boards out of her hands to carry outside. Relieved of her cargo, she settled down in a spot against the metal wall of the bus, trying to find a comfortable position without a metal rivet digging into her back. Steve got back into the bus, took a look around and ambled down to sit across from her, lighter in hand and a searching, curious look on his face. 

“You’re Max, right?” The lighter flicked on and off in one hand, leaving the other one free to run his fingers through his hair. It seemed like a nervous tic but Max couldn’t judge (Her worst habit was biting her nails; her mother was constantly telling her that it was disgusting and unladylike but Max could never seem to stop).

She nodded at Steve warily. She didn’t know yet if she trusted him but she liked him. She figured he had to be a good person to trust Dustin and help him track down the pet demogorgon he had found in his garbage. She reasoned that the least she could do was give him an answer.

“You moved here from California right?” Again, she nodded. 

“Do people speak in California or does everyone just nod and grimace?” 

That had drawn a laugh out of her, albeit a reluctant one; he had smiled back, delighted at the result of his wit, and then dove back into the questions. He asked when her family had moved, whether or not she missed California, how she liked Hawkins, which classes she liked at school. She didn’t think she had spoken to anyone this much since she arrived in Hawkins. It made her feel warm; no one had ever cared this much about what she had to say, at least not since her Dad. It also made her like Steve more. He kept on asking questions, switching over to favorite movie and preferred pizza topping until Dustin came down from the roof and interrupted them right in the middle of a debate over whether pepperoni or sausage was the superior topping choice. The conversation faltered after that with Dustin snapping at her, telling her to go home if she didn’t believe them or their story. She took the opportunity and fled up the ladder to Lucas. She couldn’t lie and say his harsh words hadn’t stung; she thought Dustin liked having her around, even enjoyed her sarcasm and her jokes. Obviously that wasn’t the case. 

Lucas, though, Lucas was different. Lucas made her feel things. Fluttery feelings in her stomach like butterflies when he holds her hand or stays close by her side. He listens to her when she speaks, actually listens, and seems to want to know her; he laughed with her and made stupid jokes and stuttered awkwardly when she met his gaze head-on. There had been no crushes in California; all her friends had been boys who liked to skateboard and play video games and she had simply been too close with all of them to notice them like that. Once her mother had married Neil and Billy had entered her life, her friends had become non-existent as well; none of them wanted to spend time around a loose cannon like Billy and hanging out with her became a liability. Now, in Hawkins, she doesn’t want to be alone anymore; she wants to choose her friends and feel safe and happy and the closest she had to come to that so far had been with Lucas and surprisingly, Steve. They... They weren’t just tolerating her presence like Dustin or ignoring her existence like Mike; they were being genuine, they were being kind. Max had always melted in the face of other people’s kindness. Remembering that now, as Steve faces down the monster for them, she can recognize the duality of Steve Harrington. On one side, he’s the guy who asked her thoughtful questions and made her laugh hours after meeting her for the first time, like a brother would; on the other, he’s a teenage boy wielding a bat full of nails, screaming bloody murder and risking his life to protect them all, like a knight. She wants to do the same. She wants… The demogorgon flees from the open window before she can finish her thought and the next thing she knows, they’re hurtling out of the bus, desperate to find it and follow it, sure that its destination is important. 

Steve stops her before she leaves the bus, Lucas and Dustin already out ahead of her and angling towards the woods. He drops his voice and puts a hand on her shoulder, “Hey you okay, Red? I know I was pretty freaked out last year after I saw one of those things for the first time.” He sounds concerned and worried and Max feels her eyes watering, cause who was the last person to ask her if she was okay? Her dad? No one? She’s become so adept at hiding her emotions over the last few months that it requires almost no effort to convince Steve she’s alright. She shrugs, lips tilting up to a smirk, tears banished with a shake of her head.  
“I’m good Harrington, but I’d be better if you stopped calling me ‘Red.’” She fired back. It makes him smirk back but she can read the emotional weather on his face and knows that he doesn’t believe her completely. That troubles her; she’s not an easy read on the best of days, keeping her emotions close to the vest so she doesn’t have to answer nosy questions. If Steve can see through her already, it’s hard to imagine the boys won’t pick up on it too. The dread sits heavy in her stomach and the scream bubbles closer to the surface. 

They make it to the Byers house from the lab and Max feels… out of place. Everyone here knows each other and seems to understand why they’re all there. Max knows the boys and Steve; she’s never met the police chief (unless the times she watched him knock on her front door from an upstairs window about yet another noise complaint count) or Will’s mom or his brother or Mike’s sister. They all operate seamlessly, preempting each others words and ideas, cohesively coming up with plans, facts, explanations. She’s happy when she’s assigned a task: fortify the shed. This is exactly what they did to the bus in the junkyard and its movement, forward motion. It helps make her feel less useless, like she’s doing something to help Will instead of just waiting and wondering and watching. She ends up with Mike in the kitchen, combing through the cupboards underneath the sink for useful items and it’s dead silent. She still doesn’t quite know why he hates her so much, why he reacts so vehemently to her being a part of the party or even hanging around them but she’s determined to break through to him, to change his mind about her. It’s almost embarrassing how desperately she wants him to like and accept her; she knows that with his acceptance comes true and wholehearted support from the others and she craves it. 

So she makes an effort. She tries to talk to him about El but it’s a dead-end from the start. He seems angry that her name even came out of Max’s mouth and lashes out again because of it. Tells her that even though she knows the truth, even though Lucas indoctrinated her into this web of weird with his tale in the backroom of the arcade, she’s still not one of them and won’t ever be. Mike storms away soon after and she’s alone in the kitchen. She feels forlorn and disappointed and a little mad but she also feels a sort of kinship with the surly boy. If there’s one thing Max understands, it’s anger; not just her own but Billy’s and her stepdad’s too. Mike is nothing like them but almost uncomfortably like her. She sees his anger in her and it’s like she’s looking in a mirror, one with warps and imperfections that distort the image but still allows it to be perceived. He’s angry that Will is suffering and angry that Eleven is gone and angry at the demogorgon for taking her away and the lab for hurting her. Max is angry that she had to move, that her mother doesn’t listen, that her father didn’t fight for her, that Billy hurts her and scares her and tries to control her. She thinks if he gave her a chance, if he looked past his anger and realized they had more in common than meets the eye, they might be able to help each other. But for now, there’s not much she can do besides try again and again and again. And in the meantime, they are both left alone with their anger, struggling not to let it consume them. 

Between her own internal worry and intrusive thoughts, she almost forgets why any of them are at the Byers’ house in the first place. The MindFlayer sending the demodogs to the house brings her back swiftly. She stands behind Lucas, next to Dustin, Steve ahead of her and to the right, bat poised to clobber the first monster he sees. Growling echoes in the dark and the bushes near the windows rattle. She almost lets a scream go when the other demodog comes crashing through the window and everyone jumps about ten feet in the air. She wishes that she had something to defend herself with, something to grip onto when the fear makes her hands shake, something that wouldn’t make her so reliant on the others, so dependent. It ends up that she doesn’t need it; El handles the monster. and her fear is left to simmer until the next time around. The scream stays; she supposes it won’t go away until she lets it go and she isn’t particularly sure she wants to let it go. 

El, Eleven, the party’s mage, the mystical, mythical figure from last year who saved them all and then disappeared. She looks both exactly as Max pictured and entirely different. She’s not sure where she’s been that resulted in the black eyeshadow, slicked-back hair and punk clothes but it both intimidates and elates Max. Here is someone different, someone maybe a little like her who doesn’t fit in the definition of “girl” that so many people in her life have tried to fit her into. El is powerful and brave and strong but also soft when she sees Mike and Hopper and the other boys; her dichotomy is fearless and Max can’t wait to meet her. She feels a unfamiliar rush of excitement when she approaches El and extends her hand, ready for a shake, finally ready to meet a girl who might understand her, even a little bit. Like most things in Max’s life, it doesn’t go according to plan. Eleven looks past her, looks through her, and pushes past her extended hand, head in the air, ignoring her like she’s a speck of dust on a windowsill, actually hitting her with her shoulder for good measure. Max can feel her face fall from the soft, excited smile she had been wearing into something disappointed, confused and hurt. Her hand is still extended but her head is down and she feels stupid, so stupid, how could you be so stupid, Max, to think that anything would change. Probably the worst thing is not knowing what she did. She knows with Mike it’s a matter of him thinking she’s trying to replace El in the party; not Max’s intention but it’s what Mike thinks. She had accepted that as much as she could and set out to change his mind- show him that she was unique and skilled, could hold her own and just wanted some friends. But with El- Max has never met her, never even seen her. What could she have against her? Max’s intrusive brain suggests that El may dislike her for no reason, may just resent even her appearance and her presence and her words. Max wishes her brain would shut up. She only feels slightly better when Dustin and Lucas move away (still casting her pitying looks because of El’s rejection) and Steve shuffles over to take their place, leaning over and whispering to her, “I’ve never met Eleven before either.” She knocks her fist lightly against his shoulder and ruffles up her hair and she feels lighter than air for a few minutes before reality comes rushing back in. 

The plan is established rather quickly but she doesn’t hear a lot of it. She kept back from the kitchen table on instinct, not wanting to upset El or presume to be apart of this when she knows she’s not. The only concrete thing she catches is that her, Mike, Dustin, Lucas and Steve will be staying behind at the house while El leaves to close the gate and Mrs. Byers goes somewhere else with Will. Lucas explains the rest in a hushed whisper as everyone else rushes around, getting ready to leave. He squeezes her hand and a wave of appreciation for him and his kindness almost smothers the fear that’s been sitting in her gut since the sun set. They have a plan, and while it’s not fool-proof, she feels confident in these people and their abilities and she trusts them all, even if they don’t know or like her. The fear takes a backseat for a moment and she can forget and put all her hope on the starting team. 

The fear comes roaring back when Billy pulls up outside the house, headlights blinding and engine howling. The pit in her stomach, the one that opens up whenever she hears that god awful noise, yawns in front of her, black and absolute and she speaks without thinking. 

“It’s my brother. If he knows I’m here, he’ll kill me. He’ll kill us.”

She’s known Steve for about 4 hours at that point but he goes outside to meet Billy anyway. To protect them. To protect her. The idea, the action of someone sticking up for her is scratchy and uncomfortable; it's never happened before so it doesn’t lie right on her skin. It slips off when Steve hits the ground and Billy kicks him in the stomach for good measure. Suddenly, he’s in the house and she can’t do anything, she can’t even move, can barely speak, her little-girl, high-pitched voice saying, “Go away Billy”. Her voice sounds like it’s coming from underwater or from very far away. She sees herself outside the situation, floating outside the room, waiting for the hit as Billy looms in front of her. It never comes, not to her. It’s Lucas instead, who Billy lunges for, who Billy tries to hurt. Its her fault Billy is here right now, her fault that he had Lucas up against the wall, her fault that Steve had a plate smashed on his head, her fault, her fault, her fault. She breathes, in, out, in, out and comes to a decision. Everything slips sideways into slow motion. She’s stood by or kept quiet every other time before when she should have done something but now when she closes her eyes, scenes of Steve defending her on the bus, Lucas holding her hand, Lucas standing in front of her, slingshot poised to shoot, play against the black of her eyelids. She won’t (can’t) be a bystander or a victim anymore. 

When the switch flips, it’s with an almost audible click in her mind. Her hand moves faster than her brain and grabs the syringe of tranquilizer off the shelf. She has to elbow past the boys as she fumbles the cap off the needle but they aren’t paying attention to her anyway. Their eyes are on Billy and Steve, Billy straddling Steve, yelling incoherently, laughing wildly, as his fist drives into Steve’s face again and again and again. It had taken more courage to commit to the act than to actually do it; it’s almost too easy to drive the syringe into his neck and depress the plunger. She steps out of his reach as he staggers toward her and the next moment he’s on the ground, still laughing, almost like he’s laughing at her and what she’s done to him. The fiery rage is still singing in her blood and her move to grab Steve’s bat is fueled half by her urge, her need to protect those who have protected her and half by her own desire to see Billy laid low and scared; scared like she has been the whole time she has known him. She feels some of the scream slip out when she’s standing over Billy. 

“From now on, you’re going to leave me and my friends alone, do you understand?”

Billy laughs, “Screw you!” He stops laughing when she brings the bat down between his legs, a stray nail tearing a line down the inside thigh of one of his pant legs. 

“Say you understand! Say it! SAY IT!” She can feel the boys’ gazes burning into her back but she doesn’t turn around. Holding the bat, yelling at Billy, she feels more powerful and righteous than she has in her entire life. She feels like fire is streaming from her eyes and pouring from her fingertips. For the first time in her life, she is standing up, saying no, saying I won’t let you hurt anyone else.

“I understand.”

“What?”

“I understand.” He trails off into unconsciousness after that and she feels the fire leak out of her as she drops the bat. She just feels tired now, drained. She bends to remove his keys from his jeans pocket and a part of her, a larger part than she would like to admit, is scared to stand so close to him, worried that his hand will suddenly close around her ankle and yank her to the floor, begin to exact revenge for what she dared to do to him. She pushes past her fear and worry and the ever-present scream still buried in her chest and turns to the boys, keys tinkling in her hand.

“Let’s go.” 

The drive to the tunnels is harrowing, especially once Steve starts to scream, but she feels more confident, more in control. Driving the car is muscle memory mostly, and brings her back to the neon-streaked California parking lot where she learned. She can almost feel the muggy air on her skin, hear the bugs bumping against the windshield and buzzing around the arc-sodium lights of the parking lot, see her dad stretched out in the passenger seat, smoking a cigarette and showing her how to change gears. It’s Lucas shouting directions to the fields that brings her back from her memories and she curses, pulling the wheel too sharp to the left, smashing into the mailbox, Steve yelling from the backseat the whole time. 

He’s still yelling by the time they get to the field and it’s up to Dustin to calm him down, speaking to him calmly and rationally, off to the side, as the rest of them retrieve the gas canisters and pull on bandanas and goggles, their makeshift protective gear. Max can’t even look at him; the bruises on his face are purple and blue and yellow, the cuts black with blood in the glow of the headlights. You did that, a voice whispers in her head. It sounds like Billy and faintly, like her stepfather Neil. You put him in danger, you put them all in danger, you’re a risk, a liability, a-   
“Hey? Are you okay?”

Lucas’s voice startles her out of her own thoughts and she turns to him, almost desperately, wanting to apologize, wanting most of all to scream, but Steve turns from Dustin at that moment, bat in hand, and it’s time. Steve is down the rope fourth but he takes the lead from Mike, putting himself in danger for them, yet again. 

“Any of you little shits die down here, I’m getting the blame. Got it, dipshit? From here on out, I’m leading the way. Let’s go.” It’s almost funny how she doesn’t mind when it’s Steve calling her names, almost like she knows he doesn’t and never could mean it. 

The rest of the time in the tunnels is a blur. First, Dustin is screaming and they’re all running back to him, scared of what they’ll find when they get there. Steve pushes in front of them all to get to him first, but Dustin is fine, untouched, just a little grossed-out. After more time spent weaving in and out of the tunnels, following Mike’s map, they manage to find the hub. Everything after that is a series of shutter-clicks in her mind- Mike dousing the floor with gas, her and Lucas splashing the walls as high they can reach, Steve spraying the ceiling- like a photographer taking rapid-fire pictures of a disaster scene. They file out, lingering in a side tunnel, as Steve pulls out his lighter and flicks the wheel. He throws it in, low, side-arm like a good baseball pitch and it goes up at once, the heat from the flames baking their faces. They can see the vines on the floor, writhing like snakes, and at the very edge of their hearing, a desperate, pained squealing seems to emanate from the very tunnels themselves. Steve is yelling and pushing them backwards, back to the rope and the world above, Dustin screaming his head off right beside him. Mike gets caught by a vine in their headlong rush back to the hole and Steve is there, cutting him free with his bat. The next few moments happen in the blink of an eye. Before Steve can even turn around, Dart is in front of Dustin and everyone freezes. Max feels the scream building back up but Dustin makes it go away this time. He doesn’t punch or taunt or curse or hit Dart; he speaks in the same high soothing voice he used on Steve in the car and unwraps a 3 Musketeers that had been sitting in his pocket. The silvery wrapper falls to the floor of the tunnels as Dustin stretches out his hand to the monster. Steve’s hand on his shoulder squeezes but Dustin never falters; his actions are smooth and calm, even graceful. It works. Dart takes the candy and begins to devour it; he forgets all about them. Dustin Henderson, tamer of monsters and owner of the biggest heart in Hawkins. Max could hug him. 

They all get out of the tunnels eventually, even if there was a heart-stopping few seconds where Dustin and Steve are almost completely surrounded by demodogs, Steve’s arm wrapped protectively around the younger boy and his bat raised in defense. But they pay no attention to the boys; they simply run past them, headed for another part of the tunnels, lost in the gloom, and that scares Max, scares all of them. The MindFlayer is strong; if he’s requesting back-up from the demodogs, there’s only one possible conclusion to draw and it’s that someone or something is presenting a threat to its continued existence. It’s not hard to figure out once the pieces are in front of you; the demodogs are headed back to the gate. To El. 

This revelation haunts them all on the drive back. They have no way of contacting Hopper or El, no way of knowing whether they’ve succeeded or failed. They don’t even know if Mrs. Byers, Jonathan and Nancy have ripped the MindFlayer out of Will, if they even can. The uncertainty and fear weighs on everyone and if Steve presses down on the gas a little more than he usually would to get them back faster, no one says anything. They pull up in front of the Byers’ house and pile out, eager to get in the house, out of the dark. Max is the last out of the backseat, the boys already on the porch, but Steve is still leaning against the driver-side door looking like he’s about to pass out. Max hates feeling awkward or timid or shy and so it takes a lot to ignore these feelings and go up to Steve; she might hate it but she did do this, at least partly, and she is worried about him, they’ll all been through too much tonight. She manages to swallow the scream that wells up inside her and when she speaks, her voice is so soft, she’s afraid Steve won’t hear her. 

“Hey, are you alright?” As she speaks, she creeps closer to the still-open door, fingers twisting together in front of her. The bandana is still hanging around her neck and it smells of gasoline and sweat and pine. She dips her chin into its folds and draws some comfort from the warm smells, willing herself to be brave. She must startle Steve more than she figured she would, judging by the way he flinches violently against the door and swears under his breath. He swings around to look at her, mouth open, maybe to yell, maybe to scream, but he softens a bit when he sees it’s her (if anything that makes her feel worse). 

“What, kid?”

“A-Are you okay?” All of sudden, she’s on the verge of tears and she just barely keeps it together, berating herself in her mind for being weak, because really what does she have to cry about? She screws up her face, bites down hard on her lip and keeps the tears from falling out of sheer willpower, determined not to let anyone see. Steve throws her another glance but she has her face under control, wiped blank and he just sighs. 

“Not really, but I’ll live. Not the first time I’ve gotten my ass kicked and it probably won’t be the last.” He sounds like he’s trying to make a joke but there’s nothing funny about Steve getting hurt, not to her and probably not to any of the others and when she doesn’t laugh, his face falls. 

“Seriously, Red, I’m fine. Really, I should be thanking you, you’re the one who stopped him, got him off me. You did a damn fine job with that bat.” He smiles, best as he can without starting his cuts bleeding anew and she’s dumbfounded. She really can’t believe what she’s hearing. Steve doesn’t hate her? Steve doesn’t think she’s a waste of space, that she’s dangerous and a risk, someone he shouldn’t waste his time on? No, no she must be hallucinating. Maybe she got sprayed by one of those huge flowers pods in the tunnels and breathed in some ultra-weird chemicals that made her hear things incorrectly. She knows that’s what he is thinking; it must be. 

“B-But it was my fault you got hurt!” Steve’s eyebrows shoot so high up on his forehead, they disappear into his wildly messy hair. “If I hadn’t been here, Billy wouldn’t have come looking for me and you wouldn’t have gotten beat up and probably concussed and Lucas wouldn’t have almost gotten hurt and-“ She’s nearly hyperventilating at this point, speaking so rapidly she’s not even sure that Steve can understand her but he apparently gets the gist of it. He leans down in front of her, hands gripping onto her shoulders, not hard but firm, and says two words. 

“That’s bullshit.” But his eyes are so kind when he says it, she can feel the tears welling up again. “That’s straight bullshit, kid and you know it.” Max tries to speak again but Steve interrupts with a meaningful look (the meaning is shut up) and Max shuts up, letting him talk. “Sure, if you hadn’t been here, Billy wouldn’t have come here. And if Mike hadn’t found that superpower girl in the woods last year, little Byers would be gone and none of us would be here. Everything happened for a reason, Red. You had to be here to knock out your brother and drive us to the tunnels just like I had to be here to protect your sorry asses.” The laugh Max lets out is watery but it’s still a laugh and Steve grins again at this small victory. But the laugh fades off her face and the guilt and horror is back in the next moment as a new thought occurs to her. 

“Billy could have killed you. He could have and he would have. And I don’t know what he would have done to us after that. I should have stayed away, I put all of you in danger, I’m the liability, I’m the risk.” She’s in tears by the end of her rant, but Steve interrupts her again, looking for the first time, angry. For a split second, there’s fear, fear of Steve and fear of the anger in his eyes but that’s stupid and wrong. The anger in his voice and his face is not directed at her, it’s pointed toward Billy, Billy who scares her, who makes her feel unsafe and threatens her and sometimes hurts her. Steve doesn’t know about any of that, but she thinks he may have suspicions. He’s smarter than the others give him credit for. One of his hands moves to the back of her neck, the other stays on her shoulder. His grip is gentle, reassuring, affirming and she leans into it, drawing comfort from it. This is what a big brother does, she thinks, almost absentmindedly. 

“Max, listen to me. It is not your fault if Billy hurts someone. The blame falls solely on that dickhead. You did nothing wrong. Just because Billy is a psycho, doesn’t mean you have to hide yourself away to try and protect everyone else. You don’t need to apologize for him when you didn’t do anything, kid.” She feels comforted and protected, two things she hasn’t felt since California and her dad and the small blue house on the beach with the surfboards leaning on the wall outside. 

His gaze hardens again but she doesn’t flinch. It’s not for her. “And you tell me if he tries anything with you, alright?” He doesn’t let go until she nods, gazing at him with gratitude in her eyes and he moves his hand to her hair, ruffling it up till it stands on end. 

“Steve! Stooop!” She moves to push his hand off her head but secretly she relishes the affectionate gesture and all the implications of protection and care behind it. They head into the house together, Steve’s hand on Max’s shoulder, each supporting the other in their own way.


End file.
